darkemeralds | Still figuring out the pattern

After feeling terribly, dully hungry for a couple of days, and getting some great tips about higher-satiety foods, I went home last night and ate a potato. Very, very satisfying and filling.

This satiety thing is new to me. Before, when I just kept eating whatever I was eating till I felt full, satiety took care of itself. Of course, I was gaining at least ten pounds a year, too.

But now satiety is a valuable piece of information. I took it into account in making both my breakfast (eight-grain hot cereal) and my lunch (featuring brown rice) today, and I noticed a real improvement in my level of comfort.

Because our weather has turned suddenly springlike, I was motivated to go out and ride Eleanor O at lunchtime. I set out to get some tea, but found myself passing Hanna Andersson, which was fortuitous, because my oldest niece is on the verge of becoming a mother, and there's a shower tomorrow, and there I was! Baby-clothes land! This is honestly the first time in my whole life that I've ever bought baby clothes.

(They're cute, baby clothes are. I got this and this.)

Livestrong has a nice tool called Loops where you can enter your run, ride or walk route on Google Maps, and it will measure the calorie burn based on your current weight, your speed, and all the elevation gains in your route. When I got back to the office I logged my lunchtime ride, and lo and behold it burned up pretty much a whole meal's worth of cals.

And what's more, instead of making me feel ravenous, it made me feel less hungry. I'm going to start giving myself goal points for lunchtime rides. What a great way to multi-task: get out of the office, exercise, get some ~~fresh~~ air, do some shopping, control my appetite, burn extra calories, listen to podfic, have a better afternoon, and discover cool stores that I've never been in--it's awesome!

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Something I just heard on a weight loss hypnosis cd: a study was done with people trying to lose weight, varying the amount eaten in the morning vs. the evening. The people who ate "dinner" foods for breakfast and a bowl of cereal for dinner lost more than those who ate small meals at breakfast and big ones in the evening.

I'm doing the scattershot approach to weight loss: hypnosis (just started), vegan recipes with higher satiety foods, cinnamon. If something works I won't know which! :)

I'd be really interested in knowing more about the hypnosis! It seems like it might be a useful tool. I studied it as a practitioner several years ago, but never got very far with it as a weight loss method--almost certainly because I wasn't ready, and it couldn't make me ready.

Is cinnamon an appetite suppressant? *adds ideas to the toolkit*

Cinnamon is supposed to be good for metabolism of sugar, and someone reported online that it suppressed her appetite when taken shortly before a meal. I am supposed to be watching my sugar intake.

It's not hypnosis as such, but it is possible to train yourself to, say, really appreciate the aroma and flavor of black coffee when you're used to in effect drinking hot milkshakes, or to enjoy plain steamed or baked vegetables.

Yes, it is. I think if you can bring in an emotional component, it helps. A typical example is when you suddenly realize with a bit of a shock that the way you've been doing it is uncool. That one works great in your teens.

I think the best hypnotherapists know how to leverage that kind of thing even for adults, but you're right, I don't think it requires hypnosis per se.

I prefer black coffee because that's what I grew up drinking. All the tough women in my family drank it that way. Letting go of lattes and mochas was actually pretty easy for me because I had a basis for it.

I talked myself into drinking coffee black when I was an anorexic college freshman. I seldom drink coffee now...when I do, I relapsed to hot milkshakes. But I'm doing a marketing job on green and herbal tea to cut down on the amount of Builder's Tea I drink.*

*Black tea, with lots of milk and sugar

Funny you should mention builder's tea. I've been on a "cuppa" kick for a few months now--I go through these phases--and yes, the milk and sugar really adds up, even though the theobromine doesn't bother me. So far, using 2% milk and trying to at least be reasonable with the sugar, the calories aren't posing a big problem, but I'm sure there are better things I could do for my health.

Well, one thing at a time. The prospect of limiting myself to plain tea and black coffee right now seems rather daunting.

I meant to say, too, that it makes perfect sense to shift the calorie load earlier in the day. At a minimum, it seems like the more completely empty your stomach and blood are during the lowest metabolic period, the more thoroughly your body would have to turn to fat for fuel.

I think I could give myself a boost this way. Thanks for the tip.

Unfortunately, there are practical factors that make a complex situation even more complex! I know that one symptom of middle age is a disinclination to face solid food when you first get up (although eating a small dinner counters that!), and having to get to the office at Stupid O'Clock makes it hard to eat a substantial breakfast.

But if you DO have the time and inclination, the Laurel's Kitchen Bread Book recommends a hearty breakfast of pancakes and beans, precisely *because* beans are rich in protein and fiber but take a long time to digest, so they stoke you up for the day. And I know you're saying, "No pancakes! GF here!" but yeast-raised buckwheat pancakes (you make the batter the night before and keep it in the fridge) are actually really good, and since they're basically just buckwheat flour, yeast, and water, they're pretty low-calorie.

An important weight-loss strategy is "stuff that takes a long time to eat"--i.e., eating an orange that you have to peel and section takes longer than eating a sliced orange, which takes longer than drinking orange juice--but you're so busy Jetsons food pills look attractive. And, alas, multi-course meals (miso soup! huge green salad topped with grilled marinated steak and eggplant! rice cakes! fruit!) mean more dishes to wash.

I've read that it's helpful in weight loss and maintenance to exercise before breakfast (certainly a lot of fit people are working out in gyms at dawn). So for me, taking my breakfast with me to work on my bike seems like a perfect solution. By the time I get there, I DO have an appetite, and most days my breakfast (either yogurt and dried berries or whole grain hot cereal with fruit and nuts) gets me through to lunch with ease.

It's true, though, that I can't tolerate eating upon rising. Never could. I need at least an hour. It's all I can do to gag down a couple glasses of water and my supplements before I leave the house in the morning.

So, effectively, I do as the French do: small petit déjeuner, solid déjeuner, and a good dîner at least three hours before bed. All I've really altered is the calorie count of each. I do really like the idea of pancakes and beans, though--it would make a great lunch. I've found teff flour to be the most wonderful for pancakes, though teff+buckwheat would be delicious. I could make them up, put them in the tiffin, and heat just the beans at work. Yum! I'm trying that next week!

Great ideas.

Also, if you're REALLY bored you can make up a big batch of pancake batter, cut lots of squares of waxed paper, make lots of smallish pancakes, stack them up with waxed paper in between, freeze when they're cool...additive-free GF toaster pancakes made with fresh ingredients!

And we have a toaster at work! Whee! I'm trying this.

Since you're going at this in a life hack sort of way, I thought I'd share the one I started over a week ago. After reading a piece in BoingBoing and then the item it linked to, I stopped using soap except on my hands, cooter and its nearby neighbor. Everything else just gets a good wash with water only. My face is less greasy and my skin feels awesome, while my hands are cracked all to shit. Oh, and my pits don't smell at all. There are other people who've posted about doing the same with hair washing, but they report a 2 week period where the hair looks and feels awful, which I know I can't abide.

Weird but true.

Very interesting!

I did the no-shampoo thing for quite a while, and it's excellent under two conditions: the one you mention where you get through the two week adjustment period, and if you don't use styling products. Styling products don't wash out with just water. So, because I switched to a style that depends on certain amount of hair-goo to work, I went back to washing my hair--but I do use Castile soap rather than shampoo.

Hm. I wonder how the no-soap thing would go for me. That's really kind of cool. I just read a couple of the Boing Boing posts--the original and a follow up--and I like what the guy says. I gave up deodorant at the same time as I gave up shampoo, but I keep it in reserve for hot summer days and periods when I'm having a lot of hot flashes.

Generally, I lead a "clean" life--neither my work nor my hobbies get me actually dirty. I could probably go this route. I think I'll give it a try!

Note to self: since I live alone, I don't have anyone's nose but my own to tell me how far astray I've gone in the smell department. Caution is probably advisable.

Still figuring out the pattern

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